Reliability, Validity, and Associations With Sexual Behavior Among Ghanaian Teenagers of Scales Measuring Four Dimensions of Relationships With Parents and Other Adults

Little research has been done on the social contexts of adolescent sexual behaviors in sub-Saharan Africa. As part of a longitudinal cohort study (N = 1275) of teenage girls and boys in two Ghanaian towns, interviewers administered a 26-item questionnaire module intended to assess four dimensions of youth–adult relationships: monitoring, conflict, emotional support, and financial support. Confirmatory factor and traditional psychometric analyses showed the four scales to be reliable. Known-groups comparisons provided evidence of their validity. All four scales had strong bivariate associations with self-reported sexual behavior (odds ratios = 1.66, 0.74, 0.47, and 0.60 for conflict, support, monitoring, and financial support, respectively). The instrument is practical for use in sub-Saharan African settings and produces measures that are reliable, valid, and predictive of sexual behavior in youth.